Sigmund Freud developed the psychodynamic approach which views the mind as having three parts - the conscious, preconscious, and unconscious. The unconscious contains desires and wishes formed in childhood that influence behavior. Freud also proposed that personality has three components - the id, ego, and superego. The id contains urges for instant gratification, the ego mediates demands of the id and external reality, and the superego acts as the conscience. A key aspect is that childhood experiences influence later personality development and behavior. Defense mechanisms like repression and rationalization help reduce anxiety by regulating thoughts and impulses from entering consciousness. While criticized as unscientific, Freud's theory significantly impacted views of personality, motivation and development.

1. Kingdom of Saudi Arabia
The Royal Commission at Yanbu
Yanbu University College
Yanbu Al-Sinaiyah x
The Psychodynamic Approach
EDU 301 EDUCATIONAL PSYCHOLOGY
Dr. Hala Fawzi

2. The Psychodynamic Approach
Sigmund Freud —1856-1939
• An Austrian Neurologist
• Freud based his thinking on clinical observation, research and
reflections to form his famous and controversial theory.
• The psychodynamic approach as a whole includes all theories that
were based on Sigmund's ideas.

3. Key features of the Psychodynamic Approach
The emphasis is on the role of the unconscious mind, the structure of
personality and the influence that childhood experiences have on later life.

4. Key Feature (1): The unconscious, preconscious and
conscious
Freud proposed that the the mind is subdivided into different levels of
conscious awareness.
(1) Conscious: thoughts and perceptions
(2) Preconscious: available to consciousness, e.g. memories and stored
knowledge
(3) Unconscious: wishes and desires formed in childhood determines
most behavior

5. Levels of Consciousness: Iceberg theory
Contains information
that we are aware of and
have easy access to.
(10%),
Holds on to information
easily retrievable
10-15%
Holds all the
information that
the conscious
cannot deal with.
75-80%.
Freud‘s ‗mental iceberg‘ view of the mind.

6. Key Feature (2): The personality

7. Key Feature (2): The personality
1. Id – unconscious impulses that want to be gratified, without regard to
potential punishment.
ID is the primitive psyche – encompassing all the basic needs, feelings
and motivation.

8. Key Feature (2): The personality
3. Superego – the ―moral‖ center of our personality which tells us
right from wrong (somewhat conscious).
It holds all of our internalized moral standards and ideals that we
acquire from both parents and society--our sense of right and wrong.
The superego acts to civilize our behavior.
It works to suppress all unacceptable urges of the id.

9. Key Feature (2): The personality
2. Ego (primarily conscious) –This is the most challenging and
conflicting part of the mind as it focuses on maintaining balance among
two opposite forces. --Ego mediates conflict between id and superego

10. Let’s watch a very short video
Watch the other video on the Moodle

11. Personality Development
Freud used the term ego strength to refer to the ego's ability to function
despite these fighting forces.
A person with good ego strength is able to effectively manage
these pressures, while those with too much or too little ego
strength can become too disrupting.
According to Freud, the key to a healthy personality is a
balance between the id, the ego, and the superego.

12. Personality Development-Educational Setting
• Teachers to be aware of personality development.(e.g.,
stealing, lying).
• Teachers pay attention to the behavior that could cause
students to behave in a certain way.

13. Before we move on...
Key features of the psychodynamic approach :
• Mind has three parts:
– conscious: thoughts and perceptions
– preconscious: available to consciousness, e.g. memories
and stored knowledge
– unconscious: wishes and desires formed in childhood,
biological urges; determines most behaviour.
• Personality has three components:
– id: unconscious; urges needing instant gratification
– ego: develops in childhood; rational; chooses between id
and external demands
– superego: conscience, places restrictions on behaviour.

14. Personality Development
Anxiety
• What happens when the ego cannot deal with the
demands of our desires?
• According to Freud, anxiety is an unpleasant
inner state that people seek to avoid.
• Anxiety acts as a signal to the ego that “things are
not going right!”

15. Types of anxiety
1. Neurotic (phobic) anxiety is the unconscious worry that we will lose
control of the id's urges.
2. Reality anxiety is fear of real-world events. The cause of this anxiety
is usually easily identified. The most common way of reducing this
anxiety is to avoid the threatening object.
What do you do when you fear receiving a dog bite from a dog nearby?
3. Moral anxiety involves a fear of violating our own moral principles.

16. Personality Development
Handling Anxiety
• Freud argued that we need to reduce the
anxiety/nervousness/unease associated with unpleasant
thoughts.
• To do this, we reject unpleasant thoughts from the
conscious mind & force them into the unconscious mind.
• The ―ego‖ employs ―defense mechanisms‖ to regulate
anxiety

17. Key Feature (3): The Basic Constituents of Psychodynamic
Approach:
Defence Mechanism
There are a number of defence mechanisms that have been described by
researchers. Anna Freud described (10).
Click on the link to the quiz on the Moodle to go over the rest of the
defence mechanisms.

18. Defence Mechanism 1: Repression
1. Repression: the suppression of unpleasant thoughts. We push
unpleasant thoughts into unconscious so that we can‘t access them.
E.g., a child who is molested, may suppress the traumatic event so that
he/she has no memory for the event.

19. Defence Mechanism 2: Denial
2. Denial- refusing to believe something unpleasant has occurred. We
refuse to accept horrible news, even with evidence to the contrary.
• E.g., you hear a friend has died & can‘t believe it‘s true.

20. Defence Mechanism 3:Rationalization
3. Rationalization – we justify the actions or events that have happened.
• E.g., A student who decides to forgo studying for an exam the night
before & sleeps on the coach until her parents wake her up.

21. Defence Mechanism 4: Displacement
4. Displacement- you take out your anger & frustration on a person or
object not the actual target of your anger.
E.g. After being questioned by your boss (teacher), you go home & yell
at your siblings or your maid.
Follow the links below to read more about each type of defence mechanism as well as
other defence mechanisms described by psychologists. You should take the quiz at
the end!

http://psychology.about.com/od/theoriesofpersonality/ss/defensemech_3.htm

22. Criticism of Freud‘s Psychodynamic
Approach
•Unscientific
•Methodologically poor
•Untestable (e.g. concept of denial)
•Limited impact on scientific psychology.

23. Pros of Freud‘s theory
Significant impact: on the theories of personality, motivation, and
development..
Freud was the first to challenge the view that mental disorders
were caused by physical illness.
• Freud proposed that psychological factors were responsible, thus this
how we can treat the origins of abnormal behaviour.
•
Childhood experiences are important in personality development.

24. Pros of Freud‘s theory
• Information outside of awareness does influence us.
• Unconscious thoughts & emotions are brought into awareness to be
dealt with.
• Defense mechanisms—good descriptions of some of our
behaviors.
•Cure neuroses by bringing material from unconscious to
conscious: dream analysis

25. Take Away Terms
1.
4.
7.
2.
5.
8.
3.
6.
9.